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Collegiate Women's and Men's Track And Field National Rankings Released

According to this week's (April 30) national collegiate women's andmen's track and field rankings, Saturday's (May 5) annual UCLA vs. USC dual meeton the Trojan campus will feature two of the nation's top women's teams.

In this week's Trackwire National Top 25, Jeanette's Bolden's UCLAwomen are again ranked No. 1 in the U. S., with 62 points, just one point aheadof No. 2 USC, with 61. In the men's rankings, the Trojans are tied for No. 21,with 14 points (tied with Colorado State, Tulane and Clemson). Art Venegas' UCLAmen's team dropped out of this week's Trackwire poll (last week the Bruin menwere tied for 21st in the U. S.)

In the IAAF-USATF Team Power Rankings, the UCLA women are still No. 1,387.82 points (the USC women are No. 6, 359.19 points) and the Bruin men are No.3, 356.86 points (the USC men are No. 4, 354.62 points).

Trackwire is based upon how a team will score at the 2001 NCAA Outdoor(May 30-June 2, Eugene, OR) and the Team Power Ranking is based upon a team'sindividual marks and dual meet strength.

Track & Field News also predicts how teams will score at the upcomingNCAA Outdoor. In T&FN's women's predictions (as of April 26), USC is first with84 points, followed by UCLA's 74. In the men's predictions, the Bruins andTrojans are not in the Top 14 teams.

On Saturday at USC's Cromwell Field and Loker Stadium, the fieldevents will start at 11 a.m. and the running events at 11:15 a.m.

In the men's series, it will be the 68th annual dual meet (dating backto 1934) between the two schools. USC leads it 38-29, but the Bruin men have wonthe last 22 meets in a row (dating back to 1978, the 1982 meet was nonscoring).USC won the first 33 consecutive dual meets over the Bruins. UCLA's first dualvictory over the Trojan men was in 1966.

In the women's series, it will be the 18th annual meet. The UCLA womenlead it 14-3 and have won the last eight meets in a row. USC's last dual victoryover the Bruin women was in 1992.

Johnson Pac-10 Women's Track Athlete of the Week For her efforts at last week's Penn Relays, UCLA freshman SheenaJohnson has been named the Pacific-10 Women's Track Athlete of the Week (April30)

At the Penn Relays on Thursday, Johnson placed second in the women's400m hurdles, in a time of 56.23 (personal-best, No. 2 mark on the currentcollegiate chart, No 4 in school history, NCAA automatic qualifier). She alsoran the second leg on UCLA's 4 X 400m relay that placed sixth (3:35.38,season-best, NCAA provisional qualifier) in the collegiate championship final onSaturday.

Johnson, from Stafford, VA Garfield HS, is familiar with the PennRelays. The 2000 U. S. Junior champion in the 400m hurdles (with herthen-personal-best of 56.82), Johnson last season became the first prep in PennRelays history to win the 400m hurdles three consecutive seasons and was namedthe Outstanding Female HS Athlete of last year's Penn Relays.